Find your real story in 2011

This is a post I wrote on August 19, 2007, back when I was trying to decide what I truly wanted to blog about. I’d started a blog called “Newsworthy or Not?” and later abandoned it as I found that community management was what I really wanted to focus on.

However, a recent request by a college professor to include some content from that old blog in her upcoming textbook on Public Relations led me back to it. Quite honestly, Id’ forgotten all about it.

So, I came across this post that I’m sharing here with the hopes that it might resonate with some, even today. And though it isn’t really the focus of this blog, everyone needs to find their story. It’s what makes you unique.

If you’re active across social media channels, your story is what you share with the masses. Your story is how you engage. And caring about the stories of others is how you pay it forward.

So read on, and I hope this helps in some small way.

What’s Your “Real” Story?

August 19, 2007

The owner of a Yoga studio once asked me why we wouldn’t do a story about the opening of his business after he’d sent numerous news releases to the assignment desk at the TV station where I worked. I asked him if there was anything unique about the studio or if he offered a class that made his studio more popular than others. This was an attempt to find an angle, or something more than a “grand-opening” which doesn’t hold much news value.

He proceeded to tell me about a weekly class for patients with Multiple Sclerosis and how it’s changing the lives of people who had previously been bedridden by this debilitating disease. Stunned and intrigued, I asked him if he’d included that in his news release and he said he hadn’t. “That’s the story,” I all but screamed at him. “That’s what you needed to tell us,” I said. “We would have covered that in a heartbeat.”

Needless to say I sent a news crew two weeks later, and the news coverage he’d been seeking for months was finally a reality after having a conversation that lasted less than five minutes.

What’s Your Story? The REAL story. The INTERESTING story? Figure that out, and you’ll be closer to getting media coverage than you could possibly know.

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This is a personal blog. The opinions expressed here represent my own and not those of my employer.
Feel free to challenge me, disagree with me, or tell me I’m completely nuts in the comments section of each blog entry.

Hey Rosemary: I think there is still a place and need for press releases, particularly when reaching out to news organizations. But that said, you are right. Real conversations matter, and there is no reason that the real stories cannot be conveyed in a press release. Happy New year!!